Not Applicable.
Not Applicable.
The present invention relates generally to communication systems, and more particularly, to wireless mobile communication systems.
There are a wide variety of advertising techniques well known in the art including radio and television commercials, newspaper advertisements, and direct marketing, e.g., telemarketing. Since such advertisements are used to convey information to as many people as possible, they can be relatively expensive and inefficient. Generally, sellers of goods and services strive to maximize their return on advertising expenditures. Sellers desire to convey knowledge of their products to as many potential consumers as possible. More particularly, sellers of various goods and services desire to contact consumers that have a desire or need for the particular goods or services provided by the seller.
However, it can be difficult and expensive to identify those consumers having an interest in a particular product or service offered by a particular seller. And even if such consumers can be identified, it can be relatively difficult to get the consumer to focus on an advertisement. In addition, consumers typically have no motivation to identify themselves as being interested in a particular type of item or service.
It would, therefore, be desirable to transmit messages to consumers that have expressed a desire or need for goods and services from sellers that provide the desired goods and services. It would further be desirable to provide messages to mobile users when they are proximate a seller for which the user desires to receive information.
The present invention provides a localized, on-demand multicast messaging system for a mobile network that provides messages to users of the mobile network. By providing messages to users of the mobile network under user-specified conditions, the user is relatively receptive to the transmitted messages. Although the invention is primarily shown and described in conjunction with a cellular telephone network transmitting commercial advertisement messages, it is understood that the invention is applicable to other messages types and other network types in which it is desirable to provide on-demand messages.
In one aspect of the invention, a mobile messaging system includes a profile proxy server coupled to a plurality of message servers. Users provide profile information to a local message server via the profile proxy server. Profile information can include preferences specified by the user defining the categories for which the user desires to receive messages and the conditions, e.g., time of day, maximum number of messages, and location, under which messages are accepted. Sellers can also provide profile information that identifies the business category of the seller and the conditions, e.g., timing, advertising range, and number of interested users, under which messages should be broadcast.
The user profile information can be used by the local message server to define a service ID pool for the user that is downloaded to user. The service ID pool allows the user to determine which multicast messages meet the user preferences specified in the user""s profile. The multicast messages can be received by all users for which profile conditions and user and seller conditions are satisfied. Multicast messages include category information for the seller along with a unique identifier for the seller. The multicast messages can include information enabling users to visit or otherwise contact the seller.
In one embodiment, the user service ID pool includes pairs of service IDs and ID masks based upon the preferences specified in the user""s profile. Fields in the service ID pool are compared to corresponding fields in a multicast message to determine whether the user should process the message. In an exemplary embodiment, the ID masks are logically ANDed with the multicast message and the result compared with the service ID. If the result of the logical AND matches the service ID then the message should be processed.
This arrangement allows sellers to send information regarding the goods and/or service they provide to users that have expressed a desire to receive messages from sellers providing the specified good and/or services.
Prior to broadcasting messages to mobile network users, the on-demand messaging multicast messaging system waits for an event associated with users of the system. In one embodiment, events include registration events, de-registration events, location update events, and active request events. In general, a message server receives event information, determines the type of event, and processes the event.
Registration events occur when a mobile user powers up and identifies the user to the mobile network. The on-demand messaging system retrieves the user""s profile and generates a desired service ID pool for the user, which is then downloaded to the user. The desired service ID pool is utilized by the user to identify those multicast messages that should be processed by the user. De-registration events occur when a user is leaving the mobile network, such as power down.
Active request events occur when a user actively requests seller information for one or more business categories. For example, a user can submit a request to receive messages from nearby restaurants. Multicast messages can be sent to the user providing seller information when user and seller conditions are satisfied.
Location update events are triggered by movement of the user within the mobile network. In general, the mobile network informs the on-demand messaging network when a user moves from one cell to another. The messaging network then informs a message server covering the new cell of the user""s location.